Finally I did the first mod to my new ISF... a JoeZ intake! I know many guys in here were waiting for me to sell my blue JoeZ because I was trying to get a black one (I received plenty of PMs), thing is it was impossible to find someone willing to trade, and the two that were on sale during the past month were sold locally. I decided to do something that I had on my mind for years and that would solve the color issue... wrap the intake. The end result was perfect! It looks awesome, and it'll help to keep the intake tube a little bit cooler. I used titanium wrap, picture taken right after the install today:

 

Nice! Ive had mine Aerotek wrapped for over a year and it works great.

 

Hard to imagine just a tube/pipe replacement gives you 5hp on this motor. Pretty incredible.

 

^ look like my motorcycle now I have the same wrap on my pipes! It def keeps the heat away from my leg

You can always get header wrap spray paint if you ever wanted the wrap in black

 

Great start!! :]

 

Just realized that you used a heat wrap, isnt that counterproductive? My wrap is meant to keep heat out of the intake, is this one similar in that regard?

 

Where did you get the engine cover, the black with black carbon looks great.

 

nice use of titanium wrap

 

I think wrapping the intake, you can actually hurt your IAT because the piping would not be able to cool itself with the incomming air. If it is wrapped with reflective tape, the tape will not conduct the cooling effect of air movement effectively onto the pipe to help cool it.

Never tested this, but that's my thought on it and why I've never considered wrapping, but love the creativity.

 

Stupid question, but does an intake replacement void the warranty?

 

Nice pic , thanks for sharing

 

it really depends on the dealer, I had a Subaru dealer in San jose who was literally fought with me and told me that all the warranty was over for my upgrades. I had a up-pipe, a down pipe and a high flow greddy exhaust.

But another dealer on Capitol was okay with these and gave me great service.

 

This is the standard engine cover on 2012 ISFs.

That was my same thought but... the intake pipe gets very hot after driving, but not becuase of the fresh air coming from the snorkel or fender (2nd stage), it's because of the high temperature under the hood. Wrapping the intake pipe with heat wrap, especially this titanium one, will keep the intake pipe cooler, right?

My initial thoughts after driving with the wrapped pipe today are positive. First of all the car feels way different between driving it with the stock pipe and the JoeZ. I'm not talking about HP but responsiveness. Horsepower increase might be 5HP, hard to feel and it won't show up on a timeslip, but the car now breaths way better! I'm not new to the ISF (for the people that don't know me), when I switched from the 2008 to the 2012 ISF I felt kind of disappointed, I could swear that my 08 revved and shifted (when in auto) quicker. Granted I had the JoeZ intake and custom exhaust on the 08, but never thought that it'd make a real difference. Actually I never related the lack of air (that's how I felt it) on my 2012 to the intake until I drove my car today... right away it felt more responsive and downshifts came faster. Ambient temperature today was 89F, the car was quicker than usual all day, so the JoeZ intake did its job and I guess the titanium wrap kept the pipe cooler during this hot day.

 

Wow, that looks good and unique.

 

Before I wrapped mine in aerotek tape, it only got hotter and hotter. Even after casual highway driving, it was too hot to touch before I wrapped it.